Grow Your Subscriptions.

How do you grow your subscriptions? This is the question that makes publishers scratch their heads in an attempt to come up with new and innovative techniques in order to boost subscription numbers. To put it very bluntly, one way you can grow subscriptions and engagement on your content is quite simply – Data. Data allows you to track, profile and personalise your readers, and these three stages are absolutely paramount if you’re a publisher looking to monetise your content. This blog will aim to delve deeper into the three stages so that we’ll truly be able to understand how this concept works.

Track

Track is called track because it does exactly what is says. The first stage publishers must do is track the anonymous reader. Now by tracking, we mean building an online profile of an anonymous reader from their online activities. By doing this technique, publishers are able to build a decent enough picture about what kind of person the anonymous user is.

A good place to start looking is third party data and cookies. Cookies are fantastic, as it almost shows a trail of crumbs of where that user has been and what they like to search for, as well as their demographics. With cookies and third party data, you’ll even be able to see what type of content the anonymous user likes to read and access and can use this information to effectively personalise. It’s good to keep and log everything you log, because if an anonymous reader is very similar to a previous person that’s been tracked, profiled, and personalised, then you can use the previous tactics used in order to successfully convert the user.

Profile

By this stage, you would know enough about the anonymous user’s demographics, but not enough to start selling to them. This is where the profile stage comes in. In order to success fully profile the user, the data that you look at becomes very important. As a publisher, you can begin to see what kind of content the anonymous users are accessing, and this is where personalisation comes in. From this stage, you as a publisher can start recommending to anonymous user similar content that you offer on your site.

So we’ve identified that data becomes valuable because you’re able to see what kind of content the anonymous user is looking at, but what if we said you’re also able to see how long they spend on different types of content, and also what other content are they looking at whilst accessing your site. This is extremely key, as you’re able to build a complete picture of your anonymous user, and are finally ready for the third stage, personalisation.

Personalise

Now that you’ve gathered all of this data on your anonymous user, it’s time to use it effectively. By using it effectively of course, we mean by personalising content to each individual and making it tailored to them. This in turn greatly increases your chances of converting an anonymous user into a paying subscriber. Now the biggest point to take from this is to be cautious about not trying to sell to your anonymous reader too quickly. This has a chance to alienate your anonymous user. The main goal of all of this is to build a rapport, build trust, build a relationship with your anonymous user. By personalising the content you’re showing them why they should choose to subscribe to you. The personalisation step is very difficult, as there’s a very fine line between letting a user free load and access content on your website before you In turn ask them to subscribe.

All three of these stages are achievable in real time through Evolok. We’re able to track and identify anonymous users and send them personalised offers in real time. This is a valuable asset to have, as due to how an anonymous user is reacting, we can send them a request so subscribe at specific intervals. Nobody is the same, and not everyone is the same, so why should you choose to sell to everyone in the same way?